894kbBreadcrumbs
North Kent Plain
• An open, low and gently undulating landscape characterised by high-quality, fertile, loamy soils dominated by agricultural land uses.
• The exposed arable/horticultural fields have a sparse hedgerow pattern and only limited shelter belt planting around settlements and farmsteads. Gently undulating, the large intensively cropped fields to the west are mainly devoid of trees and hedges.
• Extensive areas of grazing marsh and reed beds.
• Lines of pylons dominate the open and often treeless landscape.
• Orchards and horticultural crops to the east predominate and are enclosed by poplar or alder shelter belts and scattered small woodlands.
• Discrete but significant areas of woodland and more enclosed farmland are distinctive and are confined to the higher ground around Blean and to the west, above the general level of the plain.
• Urbanisation and large settlements are often visually dominant in the landscape due to the lack of any screening woodlands or shelterbelts.
• Geologically, an outlier of the Chalk and, historically, an island separated from the mainland by a sea channel, Thanet forms a discrete and distinct area that is characterised by its unity of land use arising from the high quality fertile soils developed over chalk. Open and with few trees, the Thanet landscape is dominated by wide views over extensive fields of cereals, root crops and other horticultural crops.
For further details on this character area and for an introduction to the region, please see the PDF documents in the box at the top right hand side of this page.
